Another contest at Whorange

On Christmas Eve, I reported that I'd won a signed print by Matte Stephens in an essay contest sponsored by the talented and beautiful Tula over at her great blog, Whorange. I love Matte Stephens' work and I love Tula's blog and yesterday's arrival of that print made my heart grow three sizes. I dropped it off at the framer yesterday afternoon and it will hanging in my living room within a week. I cannot wait.

Well, she's at it again over there, and Whorange is running another contest for a different Matte Stephens signed print. Why not head over to Tula's great blog and enter? Accuse me of double dipping if you will, but I just entered again and you should too. Consider this an incentive to click on over to Whorange to get a heaping helping of LA Style served with a huge side dish of humor. Not to mention the chance to have a Matte Stephens of your very own. Go! But hurry, the contest ends on Monday.

This is a scam

I'm filing this one under "how-to," as in how to avoid being scammed. I retrieved an e-mail bearing this coupon from my spam filter on Monday and I just want to do a little public service here.

Direct Buy is a scam. Their entire business model preys on the general public's ignorance of commerce to fleece them all the more. If you agree to pay them a several thousand dollar membership fee, they will help you bypass supposedly predatory retail mark ups. But I have a dog in this race, so rather than blow a lot of hot air I'm going to turn this over to the kids at Consumer Reports. To wit:

To evaluate the pitch, we went undercover at two DirectBuy franchises in New York. Both gave us the same hard sell and offers of up to 70 percent off retail prices if we were to join. Only after an hour and a half of sales pitches and video testimonials from members did we learn the membership fee: $4,900 to $4,990 (plus tax) for three years and then $190 a year for seven more. Financing is available at 17.75 percent.

After the fee disclosure, we discovered that we had to sign up on the spot or never come back. We couldn’t bring DirectBuy’s “confidential” prices elsewhere to comparison shop, the representatives said, because this would likely anger retailers who might then retaliate against the manufacturers by refusing to sell their merchandise.

The fine print in the DirectBuy contract says you cannot return items, cancel orders, or terminate your membership. When we asked if, after plunking down $5,000, we could cancel and get a refund, a salesperson said, “You’ll have to check state law.” A review of New York state law revealed that the three-day cooling-off period for canceling contracts wouldn’t apply in this case.

Tacked onto the cost of merchandise—which you select from catalogs since DirectBuy has limited showrooms—are a 6 percent handling fee, shipping fees, and tax. Goods are typically shipped only to your local center, so you might pay additional fees to actually get your new stuff home.

All of this hoopla and added expense so that you can buy stuff at what end up being typical retail prices. Don't believe the hype. Do yourself a favor and study before you make a major purchase or better yet, train yourself to shop for value instead of price. Do all of that yes, but for the love of God, stay away from these people.

I love you Chicago!

Weeee! The Chicago Sun-Times group of newspapers picked up my Monday column for today's edition of the Lake County News Sun. If I understand my Chicago market correctly, the News Sun serves the area of Chicago's North Shore. This is great and thank you to the Sun-Times. I was telling a friend the other day that my readership increases when I write mean posts and this about proves my point. Maybe it's a sign that I need to strike a bitchy designer pose more often. Or maybe not.

Check out RegencyShop.com

This is an Isamu Noguchi table made by Herman Miller. The Nocuchi is an icon and I would trade a body part to have one gracing my living room. I love every aspect of this table, from its sculptural base to the top that seems to float. I love it I love it I love it. Isamu Noguchi designed this table in 1947 and Herman Miller put it into production in 1948. Herman Miller's been cranking them out ever since. Like a lot of modern furniture, the Noguchi Table was intended to be mass-produced from day one.

A licensed original will set you back around $1300 and you can find them at Room and Board and Design Within Reach, among others. Oh man, love a Noguchi though I do, I cannot justify spending $1300 on a coffee table. If anybody out there feels like buying me a present though...

So what to do? I love the Noguchi table, but not enough to part with $1300. Well, I think I've found an answer in the form of LA-based RegencyShop.com. Regency Shop sells reproductions of modern classics and I like to refer to their wares as homages rather than knock offs. Regency's Modern Coffee Glass Table shown here sells for the mind-bendingly low price of $199. That's not a typo. This table costs $199.

I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around that price. I've been corresponding with the fine folks at Regency Shop for the last couple of weeks and I believe them to be a legitimate business. But I'm telling you, at $199 a pop these babies won't be in stock for long. If you'd love an homage to Noguchi, now's your time. Head over to RegencyShop.com and tell them I sent you!

I want a fireplace

Check this out! I wish I had a fireplace pretty badly, but alas a fireplace retrofit is out of the question. Talk about an expense! Times is hard you know. But this baby is a fireplace with something extra.

Meet the Chimo by Bloomer. Leave it to the Germans to come up with something so practical yet so beautiful. It makes me feel European to make sweeping generalizations about other groups of people by the way. Anyhow, these things mount on any wall and burn ethanol as fuel. There are no emissions, so there's no need to vent anything, let alone have a flue. Brilliant! You can find them at the great online store Lekker. Stay warm this winter the easy way kids.